The Merciful Gardener - Third Sunday in Lent
Author: Pastor Scott Schul
March 23, 2025
Friends, it’s the third
Sunday in Lent, meaning we’re roughly one-third through our Lenten
journey. How’s it going for you? Has it been a “good” Lent so far? For most of us, a “good” Lent means a Lent in
which we’re making some spiritual progress. We resolve to give something up, like candy, to symbolically remind
ourselves not to make idols of mere things, and to avoid the trap of treating
possessions with the same reverence that’s due to God. Or we decide to take something on, like
praying more regularly or reading a little bit of the Bible each day, in the
hope that we can begin to reorder our lives and reprioritize God over all the
worldly things that compete to take God’s place.
So how about it? Here at the one-third point, how’s your Lent
going? Well, if it’s anything like mine,
it’s been a mixed bag. There’ve been a
few successes and even more noteworthy fails. Truth is that the goals we set on Ash Wednesday usually turn out to be about
as durable as those ashen crosses we get on our foreheads. Here today and gone by bedtime. It’s not much different from those New Year’s
resolutions so many of us make. Remember
yours? How has that gone for you
so far in 2025?
It's easy to get
discouraged and give up on those good intentions we make at the beginning of
the year or the beginning of Lent. Maybe you’ve become so discouraged that
you’ve resolved not to waste any more effort making resolutions ever
again! That’s certainly
understandable. And so I want you to
hear today’s Gospel lesson from Luke as a word of encouragement and mercy to
you, here at the one-third point of Lent.
The Gospel’s opening
verses don’t begin with a lot of hope though, do they? Some Galileans have suffered at the hands of
Pilate, and another group has died because of a tower falling on them. And so Jesus must deal with usual questions. Everyone’s looking for reasons why these
things happened, and some can’t help but conclude that the victims probably got
what they deserved. They must’ve done
something to bring this on themselves. We
today often engage in the same kind of speculation. Why? Well, partly it’s an attempt to make rational meaning of this irrational
life of ours. It makes more sense to
conclude that bad things only happen to bad people. But we all know that’s just not true.
I think another reason
we do this is that by focusing on other people’s problems and failings,
we can avoid (at least for a little while) coming to grips with our own. And so Jesus cautions us that those who
suffer in this world are no more or less deserving than any of us. And then he delivers a bracing reality check
by saying, “Unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.” In other words, “Stop wasting your time
worrying about the sins of others. You have more than enough sin of your own, and
if you don’t get a handle on your sin then your future is grim.”
That, my friends, is
our Lenten wakeup call. It’s time to
stop worrying about and judging other people and instead take a long, hard,
brutally honest look in the mirror at our own shortcomings. Though there may be others in the world with
far more notorious or noticeable sins, we all have sin. Every last one of us. And left untreated, that sin is fatal. That’s what God’s Law does. It coldly, clinically, but always accurately
diagnoses our illness. We are sinners who
fall short.
And so Jesus calls us
to repent. Turn around. Course-correct. Get back on-track with God. Think and act with the mind of Christ. It’s not a complicated concept. If you know you’re doing something wrong, stop
it. You know what those things
are. They aren’t a mystery. Few of us sin in ignorance. Usually we sin because we like it. So Jesus is telling us to stop it. For our own good. Similarly, if there’s something you know you should be doing, then start. Again, you
know what those things are. They usually
involve our time and money, and the way we love or neglect both God and our
neighbor. As the shoe company slogan
goes, “Just do it.”
Now let’s pause for a
deep breath. We both know that if
repentance was as easy as just stopping the bad things we do and starting the good things we aren’t doing, both we and this world would be a whole lot
nicer and more lovable. Repentance isn’t
easy. If all we had was the Law to
condemn us, then that’s where we remain. Condemned. Hopeless. Lost.
But the Law is not all that we have. We have Jesus. And in Jesus there is always hope. In Jesus there is always a
future. His love and mercy abounds in
the parable he shares. This parable appears
only in Luke’s Gospel and is precious. Please
hold tightly to its promise.
Thanks be to God, the
parable itself is not complicated to understand. We are represented by the fig tree. That fig tree is not doing what it was
intended to do. It isn’t bearing
fruit. It is, as the owner of the field
notes, “wasting the soil.” It’s consuming
nutrients and resources that could benefit other plants and trees. It has no utility. No use. No purpose.
That’s how sin has
distorted us. We are not bearing
the fruits of love God created us to bear. We set God aside in favor of the shiny objects of the world. We have likewise set the needs of our
neighbors aside in favor of our own. In
our disordered state we have lost the ability to see one another through the
eyes of divine love. We view each other
as economic units, with value corresponding to our productivity and
wealth-producing potential. Sin has
dehumanized us. And our inability to
love one another has caused us to dehumanize and degrade those around us.
The owner of the field
is justified in his pessimism and negativity concerning the fig tree. We heard hints of this early in Luke’s Gospel
too, in the third chapter, as John the Baptist stood at the water’s edge of the
River Jordan and said, “Bear fruits worthy of repentance… [because] even now
the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not
bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”1
But as wonderful as
John the Baptist was, even he acknowledged one more powerful than him was
coming, one far more worthy. And that person is represented in the parable by the gardener. And as should be evident to you, that
gardener is Jesus. What does he say to the owner who, just like John, wants to cut down the tree? Our gardener Jesus says, “Sir, not yet. Let me intervene. Let me dig and nourish and tend and prune for
yet another season.” Why? Simply because the gardener loves this fig
tree that others see as unlovable, unproductive, and unfaithful to the measure
of its creation. The gardener sees
beyond what the fig tree presently is, and in his love and wisdom can
envision the fig tree for what it can become, when tended with love,
patience, and mercy.
Friends, that’s how
Jesus sees us. Many of us grew up
with a warped image of an angry, wrathful God who hates sin and sinners alike
and is eager to purge the garden of the likes of us. That’s not our God. Jesus, as fully human as he is divine, knows
the struggles we face. And so he’s here
to tend us, to help us get back on course, and to love us with tenderness and
mercy. When we fall, he puts us back on
our feet and urges us to persevere. This
doesn’t mean sin is OK or that anything goes. It means Jesus will help us overcome everything that seeks to poison our
roots or rot our fruits. So don’t give
up! We are not alone or helpless. We are loved by Jesus more than we can
fathom. If that’s the one truth you take from this Lenten season, then you have had a very good Lent
indeed.
Citations:
1 Luke 3:8-9.
Copyright Rev. Scott E. Schul, 2025 All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission.
Gospel Text: Luke 13:1-9
1 At that very time
there were some present who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had
mingled with their sacrifices. 2 [Jesus] asked them, “Do you
think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners
than all other Galileans? 3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent,
you will all perish as they did. 4 Or those eighteen who were
killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse
offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell
you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”
6 Then he told this
parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for
fruit on it and found none. 7 So he said to the gardener, ‘See
here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still
I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?’ 8 He
replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put
manure on it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but
if not, you can cut it down.’ ”
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